Review: Rest & Reflect guided journal by Rachel Fahrenbach
A review for the twelve week guided journal titled “Rest and Reflect” by Rachel Fahrenbach: I know Rachel through a writing group and originally purchased the journal as a way to support another homeschool mom, because, gracious, homeschooling plus writing in the margins of the day is tough stuff. Here’s what I found now that I’ve used this practice a few months. The journal was worth every penny. She leads you through the process she followed to help make Sabbath a priority in her own home. Even if you do not regularly practice reflective journaling, Rachel literally walks you through this journal, slow and steady, step by step.
While it would be convenient if she had chosen to just give a three point plan to make a Sabbath practice , her own wise experience understood that what works for her family would likely not work for every family. I appreciate that she has that insight. Without the slow steady reflection, it would be difficult to understand what changes, additions, or deletions from our lives are needed to find a true Sabbath rest.
The journal is formatted with each week following a non-overwhelming pattern: it begins with a short reading, then prompted questions to ask yourself and lines to write your answers. This is the flow for days one through six each week, with day seven offering a larger space to reflect, take sermon notes, and a beautiful Sabbath prayer specific to that week.
For me, I found it easy to go through and do the journaling prompts early in the morning after Bible reading. The format is designed in a way that doesn’t feel heavy or too much. I found within a few weeks that how I was viewing rest was slowly shifting. The ways I had engrained in my head as a “rest day” for years weren’t truly bringing refreshing rest. I think that is the biggest take away I got while doing the journal. My rest wasn’t actually restful. The insight and awareness that following the journal provided on that alone made this worth doing.
Another takeaway that helped me visually see how my approach to Sabbath practice had changed within the twelve weeks was the “Reflect: three month look back” chapter at the end of the book. I paused and thumbed back through the previous twelve weeks and could see that there were some diehard sabbath striving practices that I’d done for years out of habit-because that’s how we “always did it”, not because it had any biblical basis or because it was even restful. It was freeing to just let them go. It also helped me see what we’ve done as a family that does work well for us. Those are habits we will maintain.
Overall, while I first found the twelve weeks feeling like a longer commitment for a book, I now see how the slow and steady approach helped prevent the process from feeling overwhelming. It provides structure so you can spot where real sabbath is happening in your life and what areas are unnecessarily draining. If you are someone that starts Monday feeling already tired, this book helps you spot the red flags in your sabbath practices that are draining you.
The journal itself is lovely-cover and spine look gorgeous on a shelf and inner book illustrations are consistent and not distracting. The book feels great in the hand, paper quality is perfect for writing with pen, pencil, gel pen-no issues with ink bleed through on paper.
Something I should note here is that Rachel has an excellent podcast titled “Simply Sabbath” on this same topic. While the journal and the podcast could both stand alone, I find they complement each other well and definitely recommend adding the podcast to your weekly listens if sabbath rest is a new topic you are learning more about. She can also be found on social media platforms as well as at her main website rachelfahrenbach.com.
